GNOME Documents is a new application (part of GNOME 3.2) that works with both Unity and GNOME Shell which allows you to manage both online (Google Docs) and local documents.
For now, the application can only be used for searching and opening any document on your system or Google Docs so it's basically just a way to access all your documents in one place.
From some mockups posted on gnome.org, it looks like GNOME Documents might (?) get some nice features in the future, like uploading files to Google Docs, a cool preview feature, share or print documents and more. I'm also hoping for more integrated services, like Dropbox (and Ubuntu One) or Box.net and so on.
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| GNOME Documents mockup. Not real code! |
GNOME Documents is not available in the Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot repositories so I've uploaded it to the WebUpd8 GNOME 3 PPA (the packaging is based on Jeremy Bicha's work for Debian experimental). I couldn't find an official icon so I've used the GNOME office icon so don't judge the icon this has been fixed (thanks to Jeremy Bicha!)
Install GNOME Documents in Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot
To add the WebUpd8 GNOME 3 PPA and install GNOME Documents in Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot, use the commands below:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/gnome3
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-documentsOnce installed, add your Google account to GNOME Online Accounts (in GNOME Shell, click your username on the top right and select Online Accounts).
To get GNOME Documents to index your local documents, firstly look for "Search and Indexing" in Activities overview - that's Tracker GUI (Tracker is a search and indexing tool required by GNOME Documents). Here, click the "Locations" tab and add all the sources you want.
To get tracker to start indexing your files, open a terminal and paste this:
tracker-control -sDon't worry if you see a lot of errors, just let Tracker finish indexing your files. You don't need to run this command in the future or add it to Startup Applications because it's added automatically (even though you can't see it in Startup Applications).
